AMD's new Fusion A-Series "Llano" accelerated processing unit (APU) is shaping up to be a credible home and entertainment platform, but it is also carrying the responsibility of making it to office spaces. Part of that initiative would rest with the motherboard manufacturers to come up with inexpensive and durable sub-$100 motherboards that can be bought and deployed in bulk. Enter the Gigabyte A75M-UD2H. This micro-ATX form-factor motherboard relies entirely on the platform's feature-set.

The FM1 APU socket is powered by a simple 4+1 phase VRM, it is wired to four DDR3 DIMM slots supporting dual-channel DDR3-1600 MHz memory. Of the four expansion slots, there's one PCI-Express 2.0 x16, a PCI-E x16 that's electrical x4, and one each of PCI-E x1 and legacy PCI. To further make for its business PC outlook, there are headers for legacy ports such as LPT and COM (for dot-matrix printers in banks, etc.).

To ensure that HTPC builders aren't left out, there's all the connectivity consumers will ever need, with display outputs including one each of D-Sub, DVI, HDMI 1.4a, and DisplayPort 1.2; 8+2 channel HD audio driven by high-grade Realtek ALC889A CODEC; four USB 3.0 ports (two rear, two via header); storage connectivity that includes five internal SATA 6 Gb/s supporting RAID, one power-eSATA 6 Gb/s; and FireWire. Expect the Gigabyte A75M-UD2H to be a part of the company's first-wave of socket FM1 motherboards.

It has everything one would expect from a modern Llano-based platform and some more; Gigabyte paid attention to legacy hardware which can be a great deal-maker, alas they went overboard a bit with Firewire and the multitude of 6.0 gbps SATA ports.

If they can shave away a tad more off the price by dumping the superfluous "features" and merely focus on the essential ones they're likely to get themselves a winner (probably dubbed "D2").

It seems kind of pointless to have COM/LPT headers if they are all the way across the board with the Super I/O chip. Wonder why they can't just swap the Super I/O chip with headers with the VIA 1394 chip, or try to get it in the bottom left corner at least.

I seeing a disturbing trend with new micro-atx motherboards from multiple manufacturers.

The 2nd pci-e x16 slot keeps showing up at position 4 where it makes it difficult if not impossible for some multicard setups.

Why are they doing this?

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This board is obviously designed for single card graphics. Remember, this slot is PCIe x4 and is driven off the FCH instead of off the processor, which is not optimal for dual graphics and will definitely not support SLI due to NVIDIA's dislike of PCIe x4 (although it will support CrossfireX). The boards made for dual graphics are x8/x8 with both slots connected directly to the processor, and the boards with this electrical design have the correctly spaced layout.

I'm assuming the reason for the proliferation of PCIe x4 slots is the appearance of PCIe SSDs, even though they are currently too expensive for mass adoption. Why we still see PCI slots is another question altogether. I really wish more PCIe x1 slots were present as I have two PCIe x1 cards in addition to two dual-slot graphics cards, and ATX boards that can fit all the cards are few and far between.

So long as the slot is physically compatible, any PCI-E card should work in any PCI-E slot (be it x1, x4, x8, x16, etc), it will just work at that speed.

By having an x16-physical/x4-electrical slot vs. an x4-physical/x4-electrical slot, at least you can USE a PCI-E card up to x16 in that slot, even if it will still only function at x4 speeds.

For example, AMD Fusion Brazos/Zacate motherboards only have an x4-electrical PCI-E slot. However, since board manufacturers have been building that slot as x16 physically, there are reviews that test these boards with modern x16 graphics cards (which suffer some performance loss when running at x4, but nevertheless do still function).

This board is obviously designed for single card graphics. Remember, this slot is PCIe x4 and is driven off the FCH instead of off the processor, which is not optimal for dual graphics and will definitely not support SLI due to NVIDIA's dislike of PCIe x4 (although it will support CrossfireX). The boards made for dual graphics are x8/x8 with both slots connected directly to the processor, and the boards with this electrical design have the correctly spaced layout.

I'm assuming the reason for the proliferation of PCIe x4 slots is the appearance of PCIe SSDs, even though they are currently too expensive for mass adoption. Why we still see PCI slots is another question altogether. I really wish more PCIe x1 slots were present as I have two PCIe x1 cards in addition to two dual-slot graphics cards, and ATX boards that can fit all the cards are few and far between.

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I think you are right and the main focus of the board is for single card graphics.

But on new z68 boards I'm seeing the 1st and 4th slots set up for x8/x8 sli/crossfire.

But on new z68 boards I'm seeing the 1st and 4th slots set up for x8/x8 sli/crossfire.

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My guess is that for these boards the manufacturers are using the same layout for mATX and ATX boards, just cutting a few slots off the bottom to make it mATX. The one company I know does this is Intel, and you can tell if you compare their ATX offerings to their mATX offerings they are identical. The other (less likely) possibility is that manufacturers are designing for 3-slot wide ultra-high-end graphics cards, but the market for this is so small that this seems unlikely.